1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the field of insect protection. More particularly, this invention relates to a device that creates a safe, economical and practical barrier between an item to be protected and insects that could crawl downward from an overhead surface or upward from below.
2. Description of the Prior Art
For centuries, insects have been an annoyance and a nuisance to humans. As necessary as insects are for the environment and the global ecosystem, they have not been well favored by human beings. Insects are passionately disfavored because they infest food items and are perceived as everyday pests and a source of annoyance and disgust. They infest plant life both in and out of the home and infest discards placed in garbage cans. Furthermore, insect infestation may pose health risks and problems as they are often disease carriers.
Many solutions for keeping insects away from items to be protected have been devised over the centuries. One solution known in the prior art is to fumigate an area to be protected with a spray, thereby depositing noxious fumes on or about an area of protection and leaving a toxic residue on or about the fumigated area. This often kills a number of insects and keeps them away from the protected subject matter. Although this method is somewhat effective, it has serious drawbacks. One of the drawbacks is the health risk to humans from toxic exposure. Exposure to toxins and noxious fumes often cause sickness and other undesirable health side effects. Another serious drawback is that small children, especially babies, put their fingers into the noxious materials. The same fingers travel into their mouths, thereby ingesting the toxins and putting themselves at a health risk or death. Household pets, such as cats and dogs, find their way into the repelling materials which bring about illness and/or death. Furthermore, this method of repelling insects is not one hundred percent effective because some insects escape unaffected, notwithstanding the exposure to toxic poisons. Additionally, the toxic poisons have a limited life expectancy. They are effective for a period of several hours or days, only to become spent and disregarded by the infesting insects over and over again, leaving humans with the toxic residual effects over time, but ineffective to solve the insect infestation.